The factors affecting outdoor recreation experiences

Abstract

The notion of a recreation demand hierarchy was first proposed by Drs. Driver and Brown in 1978. The hierarchy comprised the demands for activities, demands for settings in which to undertake those activities, demands for the experiences flowing from participation, and demands for the benefits that flow from satisfying experiences. Except for the consideration of benefits, this concept is inherent in the Recreation Opportunity Spectrum (ROS) planning system which presupposes that the demand for different experiences can be satisfied by the supply of a variety of settings on a primitive-to-urban continuum. This presupposition relies on the existence of an association between recreation settings and the experiences that flow from visits to those settings. That such an association exists, at least in an empirically measurable sense, has been questioned in several recent studies by United States of America recreation research workers who have found only limited empirical support for the existence of such an association. This thesis has, in part, characterised experiences at a variety of settings using the Recreation Experience Preference (REP) item pools developed by Driver. The importance of both the REP items and individual setting attributes were measured on modified Likert scales and associations sought between the attributes and experiences. Also considered were the effects of respondent’s activity, group size, group composition and life cycle stage on an association between setting and experience. Respondents were also asked to nominate the ways in which they would modify the setting in which they were interviewed to make it more ideal. Results showed that settings and experiences are associated and that this is affected to varying amounts by the respondent’s activity, group size, group composition and life cycle stage. No consistent desired modifications to settings to make them more ideal were found. These results suggested merit in the development of new experience items that could better explain the setting and experience association. After development and testing, the new items were included in a mail-back questionnaire to respondents involved in the activities of bird watching and angling. The questionnaire was also designed to explore the potential effects of specialisation, commitment and experience use history on the experiences desired or expected from participation. The results made it apparent that greater empirical support and explanation of the setting and experience association can be achieved through the development and use of experience items that refer more specifically to the recreation setting. It was also established that the experiences desired or expected from recreation participation would vary according to levels of specialisation, commitment and experience use history